The allusion aroused all his own vexation with himself, all his impatience at her influence over him. They were passing the short cut leading to the Lodge, and he paused.
"I don't think I need intrude on Mrs. Cameron tonight," he said. "Good-bye, Miss Carmichael." Then suddenly he turned with a smile of infinite grace. "Let us shake hands over it to show there is no ill-feeling. It is my last holiday, remember; and, according to you, I am going into penal servitude for life. But I'll chance my ticket-of-leave. I am generally fairly virtuous when I have enough to eat and drink. And we have had a good time, haven't we?"
"Very," said Marjory. And though he tried hard to get up another thrill as their hands met, he failed utterly. He might have been saying good-bye to his grandmother for all the emotion it roused in him; and as he strode home he scarcely knew if the fact were disconcerting or satisfactory. The latter, in so far that it proved his feeling for Marjory must be of a placid, sentimental form, to which he was unaccustomed. What else could it be in such surroundings, and with a girl who hadn't a notion what love meant?
And Marjory, as she crossed the few yards between her and Mrs. Cameron's comments, felt vexed that she was not more angry with the culprit. But once again the thought of the St. Christopher, and of Paul's blue, chattering lips, when he had the chills at the Pixie's Lake, came to soften her and make her forget all but admiration and pity.
[CHAPTER XI.]
Rain! Rain! Rain! One drop chasing the other down the window-pane like boys upon a slide. Beyond them a swaying network of branches rising out of the grey mist-curtain veiling the landscape, and every now and again a wild whirl of wind from the southwest, bringing with it a fiercer patter on the pane. Those who know the West coast of Scotland in the mood with which in nine cases out of ten it welcomes the Sassenach, will need no further description of the general depression and discomfort in Gleneira House a week after Paul had said good-bye to Marjory at the short cut. For he had been right, the deluge had come; and even Mrs. Cameron, going her rounds through byre and barn in pattens, with petticoats high kilted to her knees, shook her head, declaring that if it were not for the promise she would misdoubt that the long-prophesied judgment had overtaken this evil generation. And she had lived in the Glen for fifty years.
Poor Lady George, who had arrived at Gleneira wet, chilled, uncomfortable, yet still prepared to play her rôle of hostess to perfection, fell a victim to a cold, which, as she complained, put it out of her power to give a good rendering to the part. Since it was manifestly impossible to receive her visitors, arriving in their turn wet, chilled, uncomfortable, with anything like the optimism required, for protestations that Highland rain did no harm, and hot whiskey-and-water did good, were valueless, when you sneezed three times during your remark. If she could only have gone to bed for one day, there would have been some chance for her; but that was impossible, since nowadays one couldn't have a good old-fashioned cold in one's head without the risk of breaking up one's party from fear of influenza! So she went about in a very smart, short, tweed costume, with gaiters, and affected a sort of forced indifference even when the cook, imported at fabulous wages, gave up her place on the third day, saying she could not live in a shower bath, and was not accustomed to a Zoölogical Gardens in the larder; when the upper housemaid gave warning because hot water was not laid on to the top of the house, and the kitchenmaid refused to make the porridge for the half-dozen Highland lassies, who did all the work, on the ground that no self-respecting girl would encourage others in such barbarous habits. But all this, thank heaven! was on the other side of the swing door; still, though the guests could scarcely give warning, matters were not much brighter in, what servants call, collectively, the dining-room. Breakfast was a godsend, for a judicious admixture of scones and jams, and a little dexterous manipulation of the time at which people were expected to come down, made it last till eleven at the earliest. And then the hall was a providence. Large, and low, and comfortable, with a blazing fire, and two doors, where the ladies could linger and talk bravely of going out. Looking like it, also, in tweeds even shorter and nattier than Lady George's, yet for all that succumbing after a time to the impossibility of holding up an umbrella in such a gale of wind, joined to gentle doubts as to whether a waterproof was waterproof. Then there was lunch. But it was after lunch, when people had manifestly over-eaten themselves, that the real strain of the day began. So that the Reverend James Gillespie, coming to call, despite the pouring rain, as in duty bound, was delighted with the warmth of his reception, and Lady George, making the most of the pleasing novelty, reverted unconsciously to a part suitable to the occasion.
"Dear me!" she said plaintively; "this is very distressing! Imagine, my dear Mrs. Woodward! Mr. Gillespie assures me that there is no church in the Glen, only a schoolhouse. Paul, dear, how came you never to mention this, you bad boy?"
Paul, who, after sending the most enthusiastic men forth on what he knew must be a fruitless quest after grouse, was devoting himself to the ladies, and in consequence felt unutterably bored, as he always did when on duty, turned on his sister captiously:
"I thought you would have remembered the fact. I did, and you are older than I am. Why, you used always to cry--just like Blazes does--if my mother wouldn't let you open the picture papers during service."